Brazil & Southern Cone - February 2013 (ISSN 1741-4431)

On 20 February Russia’s prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, met President Dilma Rousseff in Brasília.

The two inked a number of agreements, including a couple of memorandum of understandings (MOUs) on educational programmes, small -and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) and a declaration of intent on military-technical cooperation in defence. Brazil also expressed an interest in buying five Russian anti-aircraft missile systems ahead of the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Before the meeting Medvedev told reporters that Brazilian-Russian trade could reach US$10bn. In 2012, trade between the two countries was US$5.95bn.

The two countries will begin detailed negotiations in March on Brazil’s potential purchase of missile defence batteries. According to local press reports, the Brazilian defence ministry has expressed interest in acquiring Pantsir-S1 and Igla-S systems produced by Russian company, High Precision Weapons.

Other items on the agenda were barriers to agricultural trade between the two countries. Russia has been seeking to expand its sales of wheat to Brazil, while Brazil is looking for the ban slapped on Brazilian beef imports last year due (on phtyosanitary concerns) to be lifted. Russian officials are scheduled to visit Brazil in the next two months to decide whether exports from a group of beef producers in the Brazilian states of Paraná, Rio Grande do Sul and Mato Grosso will receive certification to export to Russia.

• Brazil’s papal hopes

As the Vatican prepares to elect a new pope, many Catholic commentators have tipped the São Paulo archbishop, Odilo Scherer, a moderate conservative, as Latin America's top contender. Vatican watchers put him ahead of another top Latin American candidate, Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, an Argentine of Italian extraction who works in the Vatican as prefect of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches.